‘No. No one knew,’ Lang said quietly. ‘But she kept on talking about her. The look on Rebecca’s face was empty again. Already she was retreating. I took a step towards her. I think I meant to open the window to let in some air and to let the wasp out. She was standing by the door. She took a step forward and reached for her bag.’
‘And that’s when you knew that you couldn’t prove a thing,’ I said. ‘She was taunting you with it. That’s why she wanted to talk to you. It was part of her sadism. She couldn’t resist. And you knew that you had to act quickly.’
‘Yes. She started talking about how there was nothing anyone could do to prove any of it. That no one would believe that a young girl could have done something like that. Gail Foster was buried in a place where no one would ever find her, and they would never find Elise Pennington either. And as for the others, they were just accidents: no one could ever prove otherwise. I suppose I took another step towards her. I was still thinking about Sarah. About standing over her grave, flowers in my hand. The flowers I still put there every so often when I can.
‘And I realized of course it was true. There was nothing – nothing I could do to prove it. No one would ever believe me. Rebecca reached for the bag. There was something she had forgotten, or that she hadn’t packed, because she brushed past me, on her way to the bathroom. And then I was moving. I knew that I couldn’t let her leave. I think I might have slapped her. I’m not sure now. I might have done.’ Lang paused. ‘I remember her standing there in front of me. And then I think for a moment she knew. She knew and tried to run.
‘She got as far as the stairs leading up to her bedroom. I grabbed her and held her facing me. She was strong. Her hands reached for me. My hands … my hands were on her throat. We fell and landed at the bottom of the stairs. She was still struggling. There was a curtain at the bottom, and she was reaching for it, trying to pull herself up and away from me. And then the curtain fell over her face, and I was glad because it meant I didn’t have to look at her. And my hands were tightening and tightening around her neck … and then … she stopped struggling and she was still and I knew that I had killed her.’
55
The room was silent for a while. Lang pushed the cup of water away from him. He rested his arms on the table. He didn’t seem to be able to look at us. I looked at him resisting the urge to say something. I let the silence continue.
‘I just sat there,’ Lang said finally. ‘I’m not sure for how long. Just sat there. I went up to her room and sat on the edge of her bed and listened to her clock ticking on the table. I didn’t want to look at her.’
‘But you knew that you had time before Hurst came back. Rebecca had told you that already,’ I said.
‘Yes. After a while I found myself back on my feet and staring at her on the stairs. The curtain was still covering her face. Knew I had to get rid of her somehow. Hide her. But where? They’d look for her, and they’d find her. But then I took in her bag and the empty cupboards. All her stuff. Gone. She’d been threatening to leave home for ages.’
‘So you thought you might have caught a break?’ I said. ‘If you could call it that. You thought they might not look for her if Hurst thought she’d run off.’
‘Yes, so I picked her up and carried her downstairs and out into the garden. There was an old groundsheet on the lawn by a wheelbarrow. I wrapped her in it then went round the back of the house. There was an entrance there that the builders used.’
‘You’d noticed it when you treated Rebecca at home?’
‘Yes. I took her down the steps. There were some old crates there. A rusty bike. Cans of paint and a few broken tools. I cleared away a space in the middle, and then I began to dig, and as I dug I thought about those poor girls. Believe me, it helped. Then I went back up for her bag.
‘But then halfway down the stairs I stopped and opened it up. I panicked when I saw it wasn’t there. I was sure it would be there with her stuff. That she’d taken it with her.’
‘Her diary.’
‘Yes,’ Lang said. ‘It should have been with her things. She was very strict about it. Wrote in it every night. But it wasn’t there.’
‘And you’d phoned the previous afternoon. You were afraid she might have mentioned it in the diary. So if someone found the body they’d know you’d been at the house that morning. That you were the last person to see her alive. Or, even if they didn’t find the body, they might get suspicious. Might think it strange that you never mentioned seeing her just before she left home for good. Especially if Hurst was the one who found it.’
‘Yes. So I searched for it in her room, but I couldn’t find it anywhere. I found a drawer full of her copy books from school, but her diary wasn’t amongst them, so I went back downstairs with the rucksack. I put it near the groundsheet. Then I buried all of it. I didn’t have much time, so I couldn’t bury it that deeply. But it was deep enough. I didn’t go home straightaway. I went upstairs and searched for a while longer in her room, but it was already getting late. I put the curtain back on the rail and tidied up. I had to think. I needed Frank to believe that she had gone away. So I took one of her textbooks with me.’
‘So you had samples of her writing. And whenever you were in London you would send Hurst a postcard supposedly from Rebecca. So he would think she was all right. But you knew you’d have to come back,’ I said. ‘You knew that if Hurst ever found the diary he might put two and two together.’
‘Yes.’
‘And you broke in and tried to find it when he’d had a few too many. And you used the postcards to draw him away to London that one time, so you could have a proper look.’
‘Yes, and the thing wasn’t there. I couldn’t believe it. And after that I couldn’t get anywhere near it because of all those bars and then he bought that dog.’
‘And after that you knew there was no way you could ever get back in?’
‘Yes.’
‘But you thought he’d found it, didn’t you? That’s why you went out there to see him after your wife told you that she’d seen him on the hill.’
Lang stared at the table. ‘Yes. I was afraid. He kept on coming to the house. He just showed up one afternoon. I saw his Land Rover parked on the other side of the road. And when I went outside, he drove off. And on the weekends he’d be there, just sitting, watching the house for hours and hours. And he wouldn’t say a single word.’
‘So you thought he knew?’ I said. ‘You thought he’d found the diary?’
‘Yes.’
‘So when you heard he was up in the field, alone, you decided to go to have it out with him? Because if he knew, you had no choice. You had to try to make him see reason?’
‘Yes. I didn’t know what the diary said. My wife went out after her walk. I parked the car outside his house by the lane and went round the back. I walked across his garden, over the wall and then over the fields, towards the top of the hill. His dog started barking. I waited by some bushes. There was some old boy out there walking his dog, and he seemed to be taking forever about it, and I didn’t want him to hear what I would be saying to Frank.
‘Hurst was up there, bent over, fixing some barbed wire. He’d dumped his other tools behind him. The dog kept barking and barking. And I thought, if he knows – well, that’s it, I’m done for. I thought: how can I ever make him understand? How can I explain to him what Rebecca has done? How can I make him believe me?
‘The dog seemed to sense I was there, and it was really going berserk, so Frank went and gave it a whack. Then he came back. He was talking to himself – mumbling. I hadn’t seen him up close for a while. And, as I watched him, I thought, he’s just an old man. An old man with nothing to lose. A lonely old man mumbling to himself at the top of a hill. What’s he got? Nothing.
‘I was going to explain it all to him. I was going to try to make him see reason. I was going to tell him that I hadn’t had a choice. But deep down I knew it was hopeless. And then –’
‘You saw the pitchf
ork?’
‘Yes, it was stuck in the ground next to an old tree trunk. It was almost dark. The whole place was completely deserted. I kind of watched myself leaving the trees, reaching for it. The dog started barking again, and this time I was glad, because it meant Frank wouldn’t hear me when I came up behind him. I pushed him. Hard. He stumbled and fell over. Landed by some tree. He put his hand up and then…’
Lang looked up. ‘Well, the dog just kept on barking. It was still tied up to the tree branch. I was sure someone was going to come out and see what all the noise was about. So I tried to calm it down a bit. But it was no use, of course. It just kept barking more and more loudly, and I thought, my God, the whole village can probably hear it. Someone’s going to come up here any second and see me. So I … well, it was already tied up, so I just pulled on the lead. Didn’t look. Just kept pulling. I couldn’t let it go. It would have gone for me straightaway. I didn’t have a choice.’
‘And you went home?’
‘Yes, I went back the way I had come. I was in a state. Couldn’t think clearly. Wasn’t sure how it had really happened. Seemed as if it hadn’t happened to me at all. My wife was still out. So I knew I had some time to get myself together. I changed out of my clothes and had a shower, and then I started to think. If he has the diary, it must be somewhere in the house. It’s going to be found. I panicked for a while. Thought about going out there immediately – even got in the car. Had to stop myself. Went back into the house. Had another drink. Tried to think it over. Someone could have found his body up there, so the police might already be at the house. I’d have to wait. So I waited.’
‘Until the next night?’
‘Yes. I waited until my wife was asleep. I parked in the village. And then I walked over the fields and went back to the house. There was a police car out the front, but the man in it was fast asleep, so I went round to the sheds. The back doors were wide open.’
‘So you thought you’d destroy the diary?’
‘Yes, and Rebecca’s body too. It would be buried beneath all that rubble forever.’
‘And you’d be in the clear. But we got her out. And then you got the call from Nancy. Hurst hadn’t found her diary after all. Nancy had it. She’d found it when she was cleaning. So Hurst had no proof,’ I said. ‘But he’d begun to suspect. He didn’t believe in the postcards any more. Not after you used them to lure him away and search her room.’ I put my hands behind my head. ‘You know, I always had a feeling after Sarah Hurst was killed that Frank was lying about something, or covering up something, or not telling me something. I kept on at him – kept on going back to his house, but he wouldn’t give. Obstinate bastard,’ I said almost fondly. ‘He was trying to draw you out, Lang. He didn’t know, but he suspected. I think deep down he knew what she was, and what she might have done, but he couldn’t face it. But if anyone else could have seen what she was, it would have been you, and Hurst damned well knew it. He was trying to scare you to see how you’d react.’ I leant forward. ‘And then, when you thought it was all over and you were in the clear, you got a call from Nancy.’
‘Yes,’ Lang said. He looked utterly exhausted.
‘But you read the diary.’
‘Yes.’
‘Did it say?’ I said quickly. ‘Did it say where Rebecca buried Gail?’
Lang looked up at me very sharply. ‘Well, no, of course it didn’t. Not directly. But…’ Then slowly it dawned on him. ‘But you told me you’d read it. You’ve got a copy. Why do you need me to…’ He stopped. ‘You don’t have a copy at all, do you?’ he said, and closed his eyes.
I shook my head. ‘Nancy kept her side of the bargain as far we know, Lang.’
‘So you were lying?’ Lang said in a flat voice.
I shrugged.
He looked at me long and hard, but in fact he did not seem that surprised. The room was silent. There wasn’t much fight left in him. ‘All right,’ he said. ‘God. I don’t know how much longer I could have kept it up anyway. Not after Nancy. Not after that.’
‘Did Rebecca make any mention of where she buried Gail in the diary?’ Graves said. ‘Come on, help us out here, Lang. Come on.’
‘Yes. She mentioned looking at her. Looking at her before she went to sleep sometimes.’
‘So she could see it from her window, you mean,’ I said.
Lang nodded. ‘She mentioned some trees, I think. Out in the fields, or on the hill.’
Lang was staring up at me. He seemed to have collapsed in on himself. His shoulders were hunched in. He looked smaller somehow. He’d killed three people. One out of anger, and two just to save his own skin. Yet I couldn’t help but feel a trace of pity for him. Then it was gone.
Lang looked up and stared wildly across the table. He looked at Graves first and then at me. His voice sounded ragged. ‘You must understand,’ he said. ‘If it hadn’t been for me, Rebecca would have kept on doing it. If I’d let her go, she would have kept on killing. There would have been others.’
I pushed back my chair. ‘Yes,’ I said. ‘I think you’re right about that. But I don’t think that’s going to help you all that much, I’m afraid.’ I stood up to leave, and Graves followed. I looked back at Lang, staring across the room. He hadn’t reacted to what I’d said. Or maybe he just hadn’t heard me.
56
It was early morning when we finally left the featureless walls of the station behind us. It had been a very long night, and I had decided to give Graves the rest of the day off. He deserved it. We strolled out the front door and down the gritted steps.
‘So you think Hurst knew, then?’ Graves said.
I shrugged. ‘Maybe. Not all of it. But he probably knew that she’d been home the afternoon her stepmother had had her accident. Or maybe suspected. That was what he was covering up when I tried to talk to him years ago.’
‘But how did you know, sir? When did you begin to suspect that it could have been Rebecca who made those two girls disappear?’
‘The night before last. I was thinking about the pond in the village and how it had been used before as … as a murder weapon.’
‘A murder weapon?’
‘Yes, the locals used to drown witches in it,’ I said. ‘Well, old women they thought were witches. Powell, my old partner, told me. And then I started to think about one of Rebecca’s friends as well. Her friend Alice, her only friend at school, said the girls gave Rebecca a wide berth right from the start. Alice thought it was because Rebecca was new. But I think it was more than that. I think the girls felt an instinctive aversion to her. Could maybe sense something about her, much as her housemistress did later on. And then there was something else. Rebecca didn’t know Alice all that well and seemed perfectly happy on her own. So why did she invite Alice over to her house? I think she wanted to prove how clever she had been, just like she did with Lang. Alice knew about Sarah’s accident in the swimming pool, so Rebecca must have told her. I’m going to have a talk with her later, but I think that Rebecca probably told her about the pond as well. She might even have taken Alice into those woods Lang was talking about.’
We walked on. ‘So what now?’ I said.
Graves tightened his scarf round his neck. ‘I’m going to get some breakfast,’ he said, as if he had decided on that some time ago. ‘A big fry-up at a greasy spoon. And then I suppose I’m going to have to do some Christmas shopping over in Cheltenham before it gets mobbed – just like it was the last time we were there.’
‘All right,’ I said. ‘I’ll see you tomorrow.’
I waved and watched Graves walk towards the street, his shadow trailing behind him and his shoes crunching loudly in the snow. I was secretly very pleased with my new sergeant. A wave of exhaustion suddenly came over me. I breathed in the crisp air and let the coldness of the morning seep under the collar of my coat. I wondered vaguely if Lang was finally asleep in his cell.
I plucked the keys out of my pocket, threw them in the air and caught them in the palm of my hand, although I
wasn’t going home just yet. Abruptly, I turned around and began to walk back to the station. I had to phone Elise’s parents and tell them that I was on my way to see them. Then I would have to drive out there and tell them in person. But before that I had to talk to Gail’s mother.
I would lie to them as much as I could. I would tell them that for Elise and Gail, it had been mercifully quick and that they had both gone in peace to their graves.
* * *
In the end it didn’t take us long to find Gail. Rebecca had buried her in a shallow grave in a small copse of trees just where the hill began to rise gently on the other side of the garden wall. When I glanced back at where the house had been, I realized with a shudder that Lang had been right: Rebecca would have been able to see the grave from her bedroom window. For a moment, it was as if the cold shadow of Dashwood Manor rose behind us. And staring out of the window was Rebecca. Smiling perhaps. Her face pressed against the glass and looking down on us all.
We had been there for a few hours when one of the men turned round and gave me a curt nod, and we knew that it was nearly over. I phoned Brewin, and we waited. He had been expecting the call and arrived half an hour later. Still, I didn’t give the order to continue.
I hesitated because I suppose a part of me wanted to leave her there a moment longer in that remote spot. Gail had been part of the very earth itself, and she had been far away from the enclosed darkness of a cemetery. She had been out here amongst these ancient hills. The ground beyond her unmarked grave was covered in a fresh layer of snow. Bright in the late-afternoon sun. A few leaves fell. Others were already gathered together in the cold, lying amongst the scattered branches.
But I was aware of the men waiting, and Brewin shifting impatiently beside me, so I gave the order. Gail had been out here for too long amongst the whispering trees, and I couldn’t let her stay.
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